Rollover in from England Pension Scheme

[Guest oxdougw]

Can someone who has become a US citizen roll pre-tax money from an British pension fund (scheme) into an IRA or qualified retirement plan in the United States?

[Lori Friedman]

You'll want to take a look at the U.S.-U.K. tax treaty, signed on 07/24/01 and ratified on 03/31/03. Briefly and generally:

Periodic payments from any "personal pension scheme" are taxable only in the recipient's nation at the time of distribution.

Lump sum payments are taxable in the nation of origin.

A transfer of funds between "personal pension schemes", including a rollover, will not be taxable. It's unclear, however, whether this provision allows a nontaxable rollover between a U.K. plan and a U.S. plan.

[Kirk Maldonado]

Lori Friedman:

Please clarify. Are you stating that whether a plan or IRA can accept a rollover from a UK pension scheme would be governed by the terms of the treaty, rather than, for example, by section 402?

By the way, I am very impressed that you could cite the treaty.

[david rigby]

Tax treaties

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations...d=96739,00.html

Note that there are three "UK" items.

Also, http://benefitslink.com/boards/index.php?showtopic=23621

[Kirk Maldonado]

pax:

Thanks for posting those URLs.

[Guest oxdougw]

Thanks for your input. I'll check out the URLs and see what we can find. At the present time all the customer wants to do is rollover pretax dollars from UK to IRA in the US.

[Appleby]

Thanks for your input. I'll check out the URLs and see what we can find.  At the present time all the customer wants to do is rollover pretax dollars from UK to IRA in the US.

…which does not appear to be allowable under the current provision of the code, which, for rollover purposes, describes an eligible retirement plan as

(i) an individual retirement account described in section 408(a),

(ii) an individual retirement annuity described in section 408(b) (other than an endowment contract),

(iii) a qualified trust,

(iv) an annuity plan described in section 403(a),

(v) an eligible deferred compensation plan described in section 457(b) which is maintained by an eligible employer described in section 457(e)(1)(A), and

(vi) an annuity contract described in section 403(b).

[Guest Lindsey]

Tax treaties

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations...d=96739,00.html

Note that there are three "UK" items.

Also, http://benefitslink.com/boards/index.php?showtopic=23621

Do you have a current link to the US/UK Tax Treaties. The link you posted no longer exists. Thank you.

[GBurns]

Lindsey

All you had to was use the search function that is on the page:

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/internationa...=169552,00.html

[david rigby]

More generically,

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/internationa...d=96739,00.html

[Guest mjb]

Please explain what is the relevance researching tax treaties if US custodians do not accept rollovers from uk pensions under their IRA agreements? I dont know of any US IRA custodian who will accept a rollover even if permitted by a treaty b/c there is no language in the IRA agreement which allow for such a transfer.

[GBurns]

The HMRC list of participating custodians includes:

Ambernard SEP-IRA

National Financial/Fidelity Premiere Select SEP-IRA

Lincoln Life

But you are correct, researching tax treaties does not seem to make any sense since the names of the custodians are available.

Why not just ask the custodians who use the term IRA ?

[Guest mjb]

The HMRC list of participating custodians includes:

Ambernard SEP-IRA

National Financial/Fidelity Premiere Select SEP-IRA

Lincoln Life

But you are correct, researching tax treaties does not seem to make any sense since the names of the custodians are available.

Why not just ask the custodians who use the term IRA ?

What is the HRMC list of custodians? If it is the list published by the UK tax authority it is extremely inaccurate.

[GBurns]

It is the UK Government list. It was given by someone in the other related thread.

[PensionPro]

Since I have not been following this thread closely, I am not sure if the following IRS memo was previously referenced:

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/am2008009.pdf